17 herders from Urad Middle Banner in front of
the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture in Beijing in November 2013 (SMHRIC
photo)

A Mongolian herder was beaten
unconscious by riot police in Haliut
Township for protesting illegal
expropriation of their grazing land
on July 29, 2013 (SMHRIC photo)

Riot police put down the protest and
beaten up many Mongolian herders in
Urad Middle Banner in July 2013.
Many hospitalized (SMHRIC photo)

On November 30, 2013, 17 Mongolian herders
from western Southern (Inner) Mongolia’s Urad Middle Banner (“wu la te zhong
qi” in Chinese) were expelled from Beijing. They had spent the previous 12
days submitting appeals to Central Government authorities, attempting to
solicit support from the Chinese State Council Letter and Visitation Bureau
and the Ministry of Agriculture to restrain local government officials and
Chinese miners from illegally occupying their grazing lands. Dispatches from
the local Urad Middle Banner government and the Public Security authorities carried out the expulsion of the protesting herders from Beijing. The
herders are currently confined to their communities and barred from
communications with higher government authorities.

According to written communications received
by the Southern Mongolian Human Rights Information Center (SMHRIC), the
herders are protesting: 1. illegal land expropriation and land sale by local
government officials to the Chinese; 2. destruction of the herders’ grazing
land by Chinese miners and military bases; 3. the government’s failure to
provide adequate redress and compensation to the affected herders.

“We have been protesting for more than 7
years in order to defend our grazing lands from the illegal occupations and
expropriations by the Chinese,” Ms.Odongerel, a herdswoman from Urad Middle
Banner told SMHRIC in a phone interview, “we are still continuing our
protests.”

As an organizer of the herders’ protests,
Odongeral was arrested, detained and jailed multiple times by the Urad
Middle Banner Public Security Bureau. On November 15, 2012, she was
sentenced to a year and half of reeducation through labor for organizing
herders to stage protests in front of the local governments and in Beijing.

“I was sentenced to 1.5 years in reeducation
through labor last November, and thrown into a labor camp in Hohhot along
with many drug convicts,” Odongerel told SMRHIC over the phone, “and I was
released on April 16, 2013 thanks to our fellow herders’ pressure on the
government”.

“On one occasion I was arrested and detained
in a military base near the border with the independent country of Mongolia
for 10 days for organizing the herders to protest the military base’s
illegal occupation of our grazing land,” Ordongerel added.

The communication also documented the death
of a Mongolian herder named Ms.Erdenetuyaa who was run over by a car on a
street in Beijing as she was protesting along with the other herders.

“As an outspoken critic of illegal land grab,
Erdenetuyaa was killed by a car in Beijing while we were crossing a street,”
Odongerel told SMHRIC.

“We herders consider this was not a traffic
accident, but an intentional killing,” Odongerel expressed her anger and
revealed that the Chinese authorities negotiated with the victim’s family
immediately and offered 930,000 yuan (approximately 153,000 USD) as
compensation to the family.

“If this was a traffic accident, the
government would have not been that nervous, and the poor herder’s family
would have not been paid 930,000 yuan,” Odongerel expressed her doubt.

Mr. Burenzayaa, another community leader from
the same Banner, confirmed the death of Erdenetuyaa in Beijing, and revealed
how the family members of the victim were silenced on the case.

“Yes, Erdenetuyaa lost her life in Beijing,
and her family members have been pressured by the authorities not to pursue
any legal action. The case was completely closed after the family members
were paid the compensation,” Burenzayaa told SMHRIC in a phone interview.

According to Burenzayaa, this year alone, the
herders have staged multiple protests and sit-ins near the Banner government
building in Haliut Township. Riot police and security personnel poured into
Haliut Township to put down the herders’ protests. Dozens of herders were
arrested, beaten and detained in July and August as hundreds of herders
carried out days of sit-ins (see the pictures of the scenes).

“From seven year old kids to seventy year
olds, herders from all part of the Banner gathered to protest the illegal
expropriation of our grazing lands and the government’s failure to redress
our grievances,” Burenzayaa said in the interview.

“A seven-year old orphan girl was left alone
at the sit-in after her grandmother who lived with her was taken away by
police,” Burenzanyaa commented over the phone on the picture of the young
girl left unattended, “when she asked a policeman where her grandmother is,
the policeman mockingly told her that her grandmother is dancing at a dance
party.”

As the Chinese
Communist Party Third Plenary Session of the Eighteenth Central Committee
approached, the Chinese authorities tightened up their surveillance over the
herders’ communities in the Banner. On November 4, two herders, Mr.Davharaa
and Mr.Tsetsengaa were taken away from their homes and detained for three
days with no judicial process or legal explanation.

“This time our 17 herders’ representatives
went to Beijing and tried to appeal to the Central Government for a just
solution to our grievances,” Burenzayaa said disappointedly, “unfortunately
our appeals are still ignored and the government of Urad Middle Banner shows
no sign of returning our lands or compensating us for our losses.”

Mr. Gansukh, an elderly Mongolian herder in
his 70s from the same Banner, told SMHRIC in a phone interview that his
grazing lands as well as that of his relatives were recently occupied by
Chinese settlers.

“This is our land. We have lived here for
generations and generations as herders. Now all of sudden, our ancestral
lands are taken away by outsiders,” Gansukh expressed his outrage.

“What is most outrageous is that many of our
herders have been changed to ‘others’ on their household registration cards,
becoming neither urban nor rural population, but outsiders on our own
lands,” Gansukh added.